Decolonising the University: The African Politics Reading List

In response to requests from colleagues and friends, some of whom said that they wanted to diversify their course material but were not always sure how to do so, we have assembled this set of readings on African Politics. This reading list is collated in solidarity with those who are currently attempting to decolonise the university across Africa, and beyond. To be clear, our efforts here are simply to make available as many sources as possible written by African scholars. The list has been crowd sourced, so if someone is not on it, that is because they have not been proposed. We welcome your recommendations of outstanding scholarship to add to this bibliography – please add them to the comments section at the end.

We plan to update the list on 16 November, so please send us suggestions by that date. Please send through full references as we don’t have time to track down the details for every source that we are sent.

NB: Currently, this list focuses on English translations and texts but we are in the midst of developing lists in other languages and would welcome your suggestions below.

Mbodj, M. 1993. “The Abolition of Slavery in Senegal, 1820-1890: Crisis or the Rise of a New Entrepreneurial Class?” Breaking the Chains: Slavery, Bondage, and Emancipation in Modern Africa and Asia. 197-211.

Ntsebeza, L. 2004. “Democratic Decentralisation and Traditional Authority: Dilemmas of Land Administration in Rural South Africa.” The European Journal of Development Research. 16(1): 71-89.

Ntsebeza, L. 2005. Democracy Compromised: Chiefs and the Politics of the Land in South Africa. Leiden: Brill.

Plaatje, S. T. 2008. Native Life in South Africa.Blackmask Online.

Rodney, W. 1966. African Slavery and Other Forms of Social Oppression on the Upper Guinea Coast in the Context of the Atlantic Slave-trade. The Journal of African History. 7(03): 431-443.

Samatar, A. I. 1992. Destruction of state and society in Somalia: Beyond the tribal convention. Journal of Modern African Studie.30(04):625-641.

Diouf, M. 1998. “The French Colonial Policy of Assimilation and the Civility of the Originaires of the Four Communes (Senegal): A Nineteenth Century Globalization Project. Development and Change. 29(4): 671-696.

Diouf, M., and S. Rendall. 2000. “The Senegalese Murid trade diaspora and the making of a vernacular cosmopolitanism.” Public Culture.12(3): 679-702.

Ekeh, P.P. 1975. “Colonialism and the Two Publics in Africa: A Theoretical Statement.” Comparative Studies in Society and History.17(01): 91-112.

Ekeh, P.P. 1990. “Social Anthropology and Two Contrasting Uses of Tribalism in Africa.” Comparative Studies in Society and History32(04): 660-700.

Nzongola-Ntalaja, G. 2007. “The Politics of Citizenship in the Democratic Republic of Congo” in Making Nations, Creating Strangers: States and Citizenship in Africa, edited by Sarah Rich Dorman et al, 69-80.

Nzongola-Ntalaja, G. 2002. The Congo: From Leopold to Kabila: A People’s History. Lonson: Zed Books.

Oloka‐Onyango, J., and J.J. Barya. 1997. Civil Society and the Political Economy of Foreign Aid in Uganda. Democratization. 4(2):113-138.

Oloka-Onyango, J. 2002. Reinforcing Marginalized Rights in an Age of Globalization: International Mechanisms, Non-State Actors, and the Struggle for People’s Rights in Africa. American University International Law Review.18:851.

Muzondidya, J. 2013. “The Opposition Dilemma in Zimbabwe: A Critical Review of the Politics of the Move.” In The Hard Road to Reform: The Politics of Zimbabwe’s Global Political Agreement, edited by Brian Raftopoulos, 39–70.

Mwaura, P. N., and D.S. Parsitau. 2012. Perceptions of Women’s Health and Rights in Christian New Religious Movements in Kenya. African Traditions in the Study of Religion in Africa: Emerging Trends, Indigenous Spirituality and the Interface with Other World Religionsedited by A. Adogame (et al), 175 – 185.

Kane, O., 2003. Muslim modernity in postcolonial Nigeria: A study of the society for the removal of innovation and reinstatement of tradition.

Parsitau, D. S. 2008. “Sounds of Change and Reform: The Appropriation of Gospel Music and Dance in Political Discourses in Kenya”. Studies in World Christianity. 14(1): 55-72.

Sherrif, A. 2010. Dhow Cultures and the Indian Ocean: Cosmopolitanism, Commerce and Islam. Columbia University Press and Zanzibar Indian Ocean Research Institute.

Tayob, A., 1999. Islam in South Africa: mosques, imams, and sermons. University Press of Florida.

Ntsebeza, L. 2004. “Democratic Decentralisation and Traditional Authority: Dilemmas of Land Administration in Rural South Africa.” The European Journal of Development Research. 16(1):71-89.

Zamchiya, P. 2011. A Synopsis of Land and Agrarian Change in Chipinge district, Zimbabwe. Journal of Peasant Studies. 38(5): 1093-1122.

Zamchiya, P. 2013. The Role of Politics and State Practices in Shaping Rural Differentiation: A Study of Resettled Small-Scale Farmers in South-Eastern Zimbabwe. Journal of Southern African Studies. 39(4):937-953.

Chipungu, L. and Adebayo, A.A. 2013. Policy and Planning Divide: An Evaluation of Housing Production in the Aftermath of Operation Murambatsvina in Zimbabwe. Journal of Housing and the Built Environment.28 (2): 381-396.

Hamalengwa, Munyonzwe. 1992. Class Struggles in Zambia, 1889-1989 and the Fall of Kenneth Kaunda, 1990-1991. University Press of America

Obadare, E., and W. Adebanwi. 2009. “Transnational Resource Flow and the Paradoxes of Belonging: Redirecting the Debate on Transnationalism, Remittances, State and Citizenship in Africa.” Review of African Political Economy. 36(122): 499-517.

Oloka-Onyango, J. 1995. Plight of the Larger Half: Human Rights, Gender Violence and the Legal Status of Refugee and Internally Displaced Women in Africa, Denver Journal of International Law and Policy 24 (3): 349–489.

Samatar, A. I., M. Lindberg and B. Mahayni. 2010. “The Dialectics of Piracy in Somalia: The Rich Versus the Poor”. Third World Quarterly.31(8):1377-1394.

Mkandawire, T. ed. 2004. Social Policy in a Development Context. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

Mkandawire, T. 2010. “From Maladjusted States to Democratic Developmental States in Africa,” in Constructing a democratic developmental state in South Africa: Potentials and Challenges, edited by Omano Edigheji, 59 – 81.

Mkandawire, T. 2010. “How the New Poverty Agenda Neglected Social and Employment Policies in Africa.” Journal of Human Development and Capabilities: A Multi-Disciplinary Journal for People-Centered Development. 11(1): 37 – 55.